by Clayton, Jo;
“Azdar stopped in front of her. She looked him over coolly, then dropped her eyes. As the lantern struck fire from that glorious hair I saw her riding fire between the stars, riding fire down to the turning surface of Jaydugar. While I was still shaking under the impact of that vision, Azdar reached out and caught the woman’s head with his big hand.
“‘What’s your name?’ His voice was a fierce growl, more like a beast than a man. Without waiting for an answer, he said, ‘Come with me. I pay well.’
“She hardly seemed to see him, even when he wound his fingers in her glorious hair and forced her head to tilt up to him. Her hands lay still in her lap and her eyes looked through him as if he weren’t there. I shivered, suddenly cold from head to foot. Danger whirled around the three of us like smoke oppressed to earth by coming rain.
“He jerked on her hair to pull her to her feet. Her arms came up. I stared. A thin steel chain was wound around and around her wrists and locked with a heavy padlock. I knew that steel. What was she that she required chaining strong enough to bind a tars? But Azdar was sunk too deep in shavat to do more than grunt in surprise and frustration. He pulled her off the steps.
“She fell sprawling at his feet and her skirt came up past her knees. I saw that her legs were chained together too. Azdar growled in rage.
“A man came into the circle of light cast by the silver lantern, a short dark man with hard black eyes. He was muscled like a bull gav and had a soft fleshy mouth that was small, tight, and greedy. He smiled. If I’d been Azdar, I’d have killed him on the spot for that smile alone. Shavat-blind, Azdar ignored him and tugged futilely at the chains.
“‘The key is for sale, if you have the price.’ The voice of the caravan man was oily and smug. Azdar wheeled around and surged to his feet in a single fluid movement. His hand on the knife stuck in his belt, he glared at the man.
“‘Her key is for sale.’
“Azdar straightened, relaxed. When he spoke, his voice was thick and hoarse. ‘How much?’
“‘Twenty horses and ten full bolts of avrishum.’
“I almost betrayed myself then, but swallowed the exclamation in my throat. The price was ludicrous, would have bought a score of women. It would have brought this caravan clan twice over.
“Azdar hesitated.
“The caravanman let two keys tied to a twist of risman dangle and clink suggestively. The woman sat up and smoothed her skirt. She folded her hands in her lap again and stared past the two men into the darkness. The silver lantern cast its light on her cheek and slid down over her shoulder onto the soft mounds of her upper breasts. Her skin was strangely fair, milk white. She sat without a word, without even a sound, without a movement other than the slow rise and fall of her breasts.
“‘Can she talk?’ For a moment the trader-blood in Azdar cooled his lust. ‘A mute’s no use to me.’
“The man stepped around him to stand in front of the woman. From his belt he pulled loose a sharag. He dangled the jagged strands in front of her face. ‘Speak, woman,’ he said softly. ‘Tell this fine gentleman your name.’
“The indifference left her face and the fever glitter in her eyes turned to red-hot hate that sent shivers up and down my spine. He was a brave man—or a very unimaginative one—for he didn’t flinch from that burning gaze. The change that animation made in her was startling. Suddenly, instead of a marble and copper goddess, she was a vital passionate creature. She was magnificent. Azdar’s breath groaned out of his throat while the shavat brought sweat glistening on his face.
“The man of the caravan bent forward slightly, the evil oily smile coming back to his face. ‘Speak,’ he whispered to the woman.
“‘Shareem Atennanthan di Vrithian.’ She spit the words at him. Each husky syllable of her dark-toned voice caught at my ears and enchanted me. Azdar pushed past the man. He picked the woman up and slung her over his shoulder. Turning to face the man, he held out his hand for the keys. ‘Done,’ he said hoarsely. ‘Collect the goods tomorrow. Word of Azdar.’
“The man flipped the keys casually into Azdar’s palm. ‘Take my warning, noble gentleman. Don’t unchain her hands. I might find it difficult to get her price from your heirs.’
“Azdar grunted and marched off into the darkness. The man sauntered away, whistling contentedly. I crept to my room and wept for her, watching the night away in my misery and pain, sick to my stomach from the black wings of foreboding that hovered around my soul.
“In the morning Azdar sent the cloth and the horses.
“That morning Shareem lay deep in fever, screaming in delirium, shaking with chills. The women were frightened to tend her but even more frightened of Azdar’s hard hand. He kept Qumri away from her altogether. He had just sense enough left to know the bitch would have poisoned her. He’d bedded her, but he wasn’t fool enough to trust her. Anyway, he was through with her. He couldn’t see any woman but Shareem. Whispers ran through the house that she was a witch who put a spell on him to get herself free of the caravans. Though I said nothing of my vision, another whisper followed the first—born out of the Sha’ir’s festering hatred—linking her with the fireball, calling her demon-born, a bane on the valley.
“She lay almost dying for three months. In the middle of high summer she opened knowing eyes for the first time and found that Azdar that first night had got her a child. She lay in that bed, little more than brittle red hair and milk-white skin stretched over bird-like bones, looking fragile as a desiccated leaf. Azdar visited her daily. He would drag a chair beside the bed and sit staring at her, hands planted on his knees. And he would ramble on and on at her and stroke her thin dry arms and fumble with her hair, while she stared at the wall and ignored him.
“She kept putting him off, refusing him, pleading her frailty. But the flesh came back on her bones, her skin softened, her hair regained its glow, so he didn’t listen to her any longer. Once more he bedded her. He came again and again, night after night. She was a thirst that grew each time he drank. She bided her time, waiting for her full strength.
“I remember she used to stand for hours on the bridge staring down into the Raqsidan. If anyone tried to speak to her she turned blind unheeding eyes on him for a minute, then returned to her contemplation of the dancing water.
“The months passed and the child grew. Still Azdar wouldn’t let her alone. He seemed to hate his own child because the time was coming fast when Shareem would go into tanha and when that happened she would be barred to him.
“I watched her when I could, but she didn’t seem aware of my existence until one day when she was standing on the bridge as usual. It was early morning, the air cool and clean and clear … one of those days when a man’s blood itches to create things. I was sitting by the old horan, letting my fingers walk the barbat to sooth the itch. She followed the sound. Without a word she lowered herself onto the rock beside me and listened to the music. I trembled and rejoiced. Glory flowed into my hands.
“After a while she leaned over and put her hand on mine, stilling the music so I could rest my aching fingers. We sat together listening to the sound of the wind shifting the leaves and the gentle susurrus of the water speeding past our feet. For the first time I felt peace blooming in her, a resolution of the conflicting mélange of emotions that had been pulling her around and around in an endless vortex.
“We sat there for a long while until we heard voices coming down the river path. She put out her hand again and I helped her to her feet. She smiled at me and said, in that dark velvet voice of hers, ‘Give you grace, my friend.’
“As the days passed, she came often to hear me play. At first she just listened, but in time she came to trust me and we began to talk, little things at first, the kind of trivia that turns strangers into friends. The days of summer mellowed and slid off the high fire down the gentle slope to fall.
“When the month Chang came, it was time for tanha. Late one night Azdar came sneaking into the Mari’fat. I woke with a nervous chill and fo
llowed my itch to Ikhtshar the doctor’s room. I heard Azdar’s growl alternate with the doctor’s tenor in a low-voiced argument. I listened. Azdar coaxed and threatened. In the end he won. The doctor agreed to abort the child.
“When Shareem came to the river next day, I told her. She walked away from me and looked down at the clear green water. I felt extraordinarily helpless, just stood there with my hands hanging down and my tongue twice the size of my mouth. She turned and walked back to me. An affectionate smile on her face, she drew her hand gently down my cheek; I could scarcely breathe.
“‘Don’t be afraid of me,’ she said softly. ‘I need you, young friend, I’m so alone here.…’ Her voice trailed off and her eyes grew sad.
“I swallowed, feeling a fool because the words stuck in my throat. With great clumsy hands I reached out to her. She touched me fleetingly, then walked away. I watched her until my stupid brain began to work again. I ran after her.
“Azdar found us in the patio of his house, sitting quietly on a bench under the housetree. That bench is gone now. Qumri burned it. He told her what he wanted. She sat silent with her hands clasped in her lap, her face a calm mask.
“She turned those greenstone eyes on Ikhtshar and he shivered, although the morning was already hot. Then it was Azdar’s turn to blench. Her eyes fixed on him, cold as winter mornings, she asked very softly, ‘I’ve got nothing to say about this?’
“With a visible effort Azdar pulled free from the spell and nodded grimly. The doctor stared at his toes and said nothing.
“Shareem stood up. I can remember thinking how graceful she was in spite of the child’s added weight. Her eyes were glittering again while power swirled around her so thick it was hard to breathe. ‘For your greed and for your fear,’ she said to Ikhtshar, her mouth curling scornfully. ‘Greed that makes you deny your deepest beliefs.’ The words vibrated in the air so that it was hard to hear them. ‘For your dereliction, I have this gift.’
“She lifted her hand and pointed her forefinger at the shivering and paralyzed doctor. A bright glow like golden honey gathered about that hand. With her mouth fixed in that curling, contemptuous smile, she flicked her fingers so that the glow flew in a glittering arc and splashed over his rigid face. As it struck, a thin keening burst from his throat. Before the sound died he crashed to the grass and shattered. Like brittle glass he broke into a hundred hard jagged pieces.
“I swallowed and turned my eyes away, unable to look at those horrible fragments.
“Shareem turned her green gaze on Azdar. ‘So,’ she said, her voice chillingly soft. ‘You want to kill my baby to keep on using my body.’ The smile vanished. ‘I didn’t ask for this baby. But it’s mine; nobody takes what’s mine. I am Vryhh.’
“She lifted her head proudly. ‘Vryhh. I swear to you, if you so much as brush against my hand, you’ll never be a man again for any woman.’ She flung out an arm, pointing at the gory shreds by her feet. ‘I should put you with him. For our child’s sake, you live. The child you want to kill. Bless her, Azdar, she has saved your life.’ She cupped her hands so that they filled with that honey-amber light. It eddied out from her fingers, diffusing like smoke into the charged air.
“That terrible smile curled her lips again as she lifted her head. Her hair stirred with a life of its own, tendrils floating out from her face into air that twisted around her like heat waves at high noon. She lowered her hands slightly and bent her head over the pool of light. Her lips moved, dropping silent words into the slowly seething glow.
“As her eyes left him, Azdar tried to move. I watched him strain and saw the terror born in his face as he found he could not. I looked around, avoiding with my eyes the dead lumps of flesh a foot from my toes. Qumri stood just behind Azdar, her own face a mask of terror. Slowly, one by one, the asiri and the folk of Azdar stumbled out of the house onto the patio and stood like frozen statues in front of the bushes.
“Shareem kept staring down at the golden light cupped in her hands. I swallowed and shifted my cramped legs. Shareem turned her head toward me and for a second I thrilled with fear. Then she winked and her mouth curled one side up in a wry grin completely different from that terrifying smile she’d worn on her face seconds before. This took only a fraction of a second, but I relaxed and watched the rest of the show with intense interest, and, I must confess, more than a little smugness.
“‘Hear this,’ she said in a voice throbbing with power. ‘I lay this curse on the house of Azdar and on the head of Azdar. Seed of mine will lay waste this house. Seed of Azdar will bring him down. As long as the child in my womb lives happy in the house of Azdar, so long shall that house prosper and be fruitful. So long shall the valley of the Raqsidan be blessed. But I hang this like a sword of power over your heads. Should my child meet pain or death, the hearts and minds of the house of Azdar will crumple like the stones of the house. The house will fall until not one stone remains on another. And this I hang like a sword of power over your heads. Should of my child will shatter this house.’ She laughed, a high keening wail, cold as the wind in a winter storm. ‘Watch, you clods. Keep fearful watch for a red-haired man with angry green eyes. Shiver in your shoes, you world-bound dirt-eaters.’
“Even now I remember how I trembled at the sound of her voice and the terrible exaltation in her face. Shivered even when I knew she was putting it on, making fools out of them all for some purpose I couldn’t understand.
“‘That you may know …’ Shareem separated her hands, the golden light clinging around each of them. She pointed a finger and the inner wall of the patio crumpled with a roar, opening out the majlis like a stepped-on box.
“‘And that you may know I have the power to bless …’ She flung that glow from her left hand at the tumbling stones and they lifted, sailing into place till the wall was intact again. Then she walked quietly away.
“After that she lived at the Mari’fat. The Raqsidan settled into an uneasy peace and she went into tanha. When her time came she gave birth to a daughter just as she had said. She called the child Aleytys, which meant wanderer she said. Her labor was long and hard, but her strength was too great to be drained. Azdar came in to see her, hoping that in her weakness he could conquer her once more. But she laughed at him, her face shining with the sweat of her travail. He swerved from her and bent over the child’s cradle. When he reached down to touch the baby, Shareem laughed. A deadly weakness spread through his body, sending him crashing to his knees. He left hastily and didn’t come near again.
“Summer yellowed into autumn and the harvest brought delight. On the rows of vrisha bushes the pods hung bursting with fiber, their weight so great the branches swept the ground. Most of the gav dropped twins. Zardal, hullyu, and allucheh sagged under the weight of their fruit while the nut trees dropped meter-high piles onto the raked earth. Even the breadgrass doubled the number of seed stalks. As food, meat, and fiber piled in the houses, a wild hilarity streamed through the valley. We labored in the fields by day and danced half the night, wrapping ourselves in straw and drinking rivers of hulluwine.
“As the months passed, the child Aleytys grew like a little weed. She had the red hair of her mother but her eyes were bluer than green, shining like jewels in her small round face. She was a laughing baby, blessed with charm to call the mice out of the walls. But even then there was a kind of bewilderment in her as all but a few backed away from her friendly advances.
“At the Mari’fat Shareem spent long hours with the books and records. Because I had to be there much of the time myself since I was learning the songs, we were together hour on hour. After a while we started talking again, but she never said what she was looking for and I never asked. The months slipped away in front of the library fire while the storm winds piled the snow deeper and deeper up the sides of the house, ten … twenty meters until the attic doors were opened and the mardha slid from house to house on the crust. Inside, though, it was warm and comfortable. Small Aleytys lay on her quilts and gurgled and played
with her toes while we read and studied.
“Unfortunately the quiet winter months passed. In the turbulence of thaw when the roads were rivers of mud and the Raqsidan a battering ram of broken ice, Shareem found the thing she was looking for. As I fought the damp inside the walls with the other apprentices she came to me and showed me an old leather-bound book. Pages were falling out of it and a green mold was eating a malodorous hole in the first part. She opened it in front of my nose and I winced away from the smell. The ink of the handwritten text was so faded I had to strain to make out the words. Excitement glowed in her brilliant eyes as she shook this shabby remnant under my ignorant nose.
“‘Keep this, Vajd-mi,’ she told me in a tense whisper, her eyes darting past me at the others ironing the walls dry. Even when it was a tiny thread of sound her marvelous voice thrilled through me. ‘Show this to Aleytys when you think the time is right. There’s a letter inside for her.’
“‘But …’
“She put her hand across my mouth. “Hush,’ she said urgently. ‘Promise me.’
“‘But how will I know …’
“‘Promise me.’
“‘I swear. I’ll give the book to Aleytys when the time comes.’ I took the book carefully, suppressing my distaste at the crumbling filthy thing. But …’
“‘Don’t worry.’ She smiled and patted my hand. ‘I trust your understanding. You’ll know.’
“Reluctantly I tucked the book inside my abba, resolving to scrub both it and myself as soon as possible. I looked at her then, struggling to find the words to express the confusion and questions churning inside me. I looked at that gently sweating face, hair straggling in tiny wisps around it, and got a sense of barely controlled urgency. ‘Why …’ I stumbled out.
“‘Why won’t I be here?’ She put her hand on my arm again. Her fingers were hot and trembling slightly. ‘I’ll be back with my own.’ She laughed nervously and wiped the strands of hair back from her damp face. ‘Or I’ll be dead.’
“‘And Aleytys?’